A Voice Within, by Marilyn Braendeholm

A Voice Within
by Marilyn Braendeholm

And there’s the sun. Climbing
the horizon. Drifting. Light
strung through trees. It sings
with a foggy voice, joining
impatient birds. And, I see

the birdbath needs refilling;
blackbirds drum their wings,
spilling water from their
tasselled tails. And, there
in the corner by the fence,

the roses are full heads
of bloom. I’ll cut a pillar
of fired-orange, a bouquet
for the table. A displayed
feast for lunch. And after,

I’ll re-oil the cutting board –
the teak one. I love it, and
my affection for it’s showing.
It’s old. Honourable. Sturdy.
Worn. Like my sensible shoes.

So I take on tasks by minutes.
Each day an epithet at sunset.

Marilyn ‘Misky’ Braendeholm lives in the UK surrounded by flowers, grapevines, and the rolling hills of West Sussex. She never buys clothing without pockets. Her work is widely published.

May Again, by Salvatore Buttaci

May Again
by Salvatore Buttaci

In floral finery
these petaled debutantes
come alive in spring,
bursting from beds of seeds
in May’s post-winter sleep.
The garden celebrates!

Teeming rains of April?
the capricious madness
of March? All gone at last.
The warm winds, once brutal,
Now lead flowers to dance.
The garden celebrates!

This be their season’s joy:
To delight in the waft
of their fragrance carried
by the breeze and divided
among lonely lovers.
The garden celebrates!

Note: Written in response to Red Wolf Poems, Prompt 286.

Salvatore Buttaci won the $500 Cyber-wit Poetry Award in 2007. His story collections, Flashing My Shorts and 200 Shorts, were published by All Things That Matter Press. His work has appeared in such publications as The New York Times and The Writer. He and his wife Sharon reside in West Virginia.

Dark Forest Of The Soul, by Debi Swim

Dark Forest Of The Soul
by Debi Swim

It smells like fear
acrid, sharp, razor sharp
after the safety of knowing,
not questioning, having faith.
I don’t like this part of the woods
I’m finding myself in. It’s lonely
here. Quiet. Every snap of a twig
sounds like a gunshot. I flinch.

It smells like disease. Unhealthy,
musty, rank cheese, beginnings
of rot. Yet, if truth is true then
perhaps this isn’t the end though
it must seem that way to a tadpole,
a caterpillar, polyps. Metamorphosis.
Not death. Development. Growth.
Transformation. Transmutation. Change.

It smells like petrichor. Rain after a long
dry spell. Refreshing. Healing. A tinge of
newness, beginnings, hope, something
more than before. Deeper than. A quenching.
I can’t go back. I’m too far in. I’ll follow
this path to its end. I’ll trust that this path
brings me to the light and I’ll blink my eyes
at its glory after the darkness of the forest. Amen.

Note: Written in response to Red Wolf Poems, Prompt 281.

Debi Swim is a wife, mother, grandmother and persistent WV poet.